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Thursday, 24 July 2014

Myanmar-based DMCs get digital upgrades

THE upgrading of Myanmar's data networks by new telecomms companies in the country are facilitating DMCs' own systems upgrade with many turning to software-based solutions to handle bookings.

A spokesperson from a Yangon-based travel agency who wished to remain anonymous, remarked: “Myanmar’s recent opening resulted in more bookings, and therefore we need a software that can handle this increased workload.”

Such software would allow travel consultants selling packages to perform faster single and cross-country package calculations, as compared to doing them manually.Local offices of Asian DMCs can also provide real-time data to headquarters to enable management to react faster to changes in booking patterns and observe trends for the future.

Take-up of software solutions were lacklustre before due to Myanmar’s slow bandwidth, coupled with power outages that made sending and receiving data a tedious task.

Khiri Travel Myanmar is one such company that has implemented new software. Vice president Andre van der Marck commented: “Our Myanmar office now has a real chance to catch up with our (12) other Khiri offices in terms of getting online back office systems aligned.”

However, the same spokesperson from the Yangon-based travel agency pointed out: “Introducing a software-based solution means a lot of extra work that cannot be done by our staff while they are busy with day-to-day schedules. Therefore we need to hire professionals who will implement our software cleanly and provide training to our staff during the process.”